Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled in favor of the American people yesterday

by iced jamb

Gov. Rick Snyder and Mayor Dave Bing are not Tea Partiers.

Bing is a Democrat, while Snyder campaigned on a ten point plan that includes enviro-wacko policies such as “researching and implementing alternative and clean energy solutions,” not to mention failed health care ideas such as “setting up public/private partnerships to reduce health care costs.”

However, both Snyder and Bing have shown their willingness to cut spending and reform the public employee system respectively.

Snyder’s first budget proposal cut $1.8 billion in spending, with roughly $580 million of those cuts directed at public schools. Snyder’s proposed cuts caused teachers to protest at the capitol building.

Meanwhile Bing proposed to reform both public pensions and healthcare benefits for Detroit city workers. Both Snyder and Bing have correctly explained how their reforms are absolutely necessary.

Much like Snyder and Bing, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker proposed a law that “was needed to help address the state’s $3.6 billion budget shortfall.” But here’s the catch: the law also repeals much of the collective bargaining “rights” of public sector unions.

The law was originally voided by Dane County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi because it was supposedly passed illegally. But yesterday, a 4-3 decision by the Wisconsin Supreme Court reinstated it.

From a practical standpoint, the 4-3 decision only affects the citizens of Wisconsin. However, the decision has significant positive implications for the rest of America.

For starters, the Court reinstated a law which curbs government spending via reforming the public employee system. Mayor Bing has made little traction trying to do this, but yesterday’s decision should give Bing the hope that if the City Council miraculously manages to pass such a law, it will withstand legal scrutiny.

Much more importantly, the Court reinstated a law that takes away from public unions what they never should have had in the first place. Labor Economics expert James Sherk explains how collective bargaining by public unions actually works:

The founders of the labor movement viewed unions as a vehicle to get workers more of the profits they help create. Government workers, however, don’t generate profits. They merely negotiate for more tax money.

…

Government collective bargaining means voters do not have the final say on public policy. Instead their elected representatives must negotiate spending and policy decisions with unions. That is not exactly democratic – a fact that unions once recognized.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court effectively reinstated a law greatly curbing how much personal wealth the public unions can steal from private citizens, and that is a clear-cut symbolic victory for working Americans everywhere.